


The Moon is a Piece of Me

by alwaysenduphere



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Sam/Dean Mini-Bang 2011
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-07
Updated: 2011-10-07
Packaged: 2017-10-24 09:21:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/261730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alwaysenduphere/pseuds/alwaysenduphere
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It starts (and ends) in the same location, with the same car, the same company, and the same hopes and fears hanging over their heads. There’s beer and staring at stars, an angel who thinks he’s a god, a cranky old hunter with too much time on his hands, and a brother with maybe just a few screws loose in his head. But at the heart of all, there’s Dean and there’s Sam, together, just like it’ll always be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Moon is a Piece of Me

**Author's Note:**

> AU from the end of Season Six.
> 
> [Masterpost @ LJ](http://alwaysenduphere.livejournal.com/368450.html)   
> [Art Post @ LJ](http://amber1960.livejournal.com/74975.html)

I.

Some days are good.

Dean spends a good portion of the time he’s allotted today for fixing the Impala shooing away kittens. It’s not a new occurrence, the interruptions steadily increasing over the weeks as the kittens get bigger. There are days he’ll be elbow-deep in her hood, grease smudged across his forehead and a tremble in his arms from working for hours on end in the summer heat, and then he’ll hear a little ‘meow’ or the pitter-patter of tiny feet scampering across the windshield. Sometimes he will let them continue on their merry way - like when he’s too caught up in the insides of his girl to worry about a few stray paw prints on an already dusty car. Most times, though, he untangles his hands from whatever piece he’s trying to coax a few more years out of, pokes his head around the hood and shouts, “Scat!” in the direction of a fluffy tail and a little button nose.

Today is a different day. Today, he yells for his brother, because Sam has not stepped outside all month, Dean is growing tired of making vampire jokes, and humor only goes so far. At the sound of Dean calling his name, Sam comes ambling out Bobby’s back door for the first time in weeks, his head pointed to the ground and his hands in his pockets, looking more like a shy child of thirteen than a grown man of nearly thirty.

Even with the way he hunches his shoulders to look smaller and the weight he’s lost over the past few months of inactivity, he still looks every bit as intimidating as he had the first time Dean saw him upon his return from hell, like a solid wall you wouldn’t want to upset. But the shirt he’s wearing is an older one of Dean’s and barely fits him, and his hair is shaggier than it usually is; Dean tried to go at it with the scissors about a week ago but Sam whimpered whenever the shears got close and Dean didn’t want to push.

Lately, Dean spends far too much time staring at his brother - learning and relearning all Sam’s little tics, figuring out what constitutes a good day and which signals mean that the day will be long and Dean will have to find that unending well of patience he’s never yet managed to tap. Dean’s thankful for the good days.

“Your little friends here won’t leave me alone,” Dean says, squinting against the evening sun to see the outline of his brother, even as Sam stops moving only a few steps away from the back door, never too far from an escape route for fear that something could go wrong.

Sam looks up at him and shrugs, glances around the scrap yard like he’s hoping to find his sanity in between the rows of forgotten Buicks before settling on the hulk of the Impala. He waves a hand at it and Dean reads the question in the gesture.

“The Impala’s coming along all right. I’m still waiting on a bunch of parts. Might as well fix as much as I can while we’ve got the downtime, you know?” Sam doesn’t reply. “Bobby said he ordered them but he gave me that whole speech on how she’s an aging beauty queen and makeup’s harder to find these days, and blah blah blah. I started tuning him out once he mentioned makeup. There’s only so much metaphor I can take at a time.” Another of the kittens, the one Dean thinks is the runt of the bunch, with a crooked little tail and lopsided ears, jumps up into his tool box and knocks a wrench to the ground. “These cats, though. See what I mean, Sam? Your patch of tribbles is really getting on my nerves.”

One of the kittens chirps when it notices Sam and pads its way over to Sam’s feet, wrapping its way in and out between his legs in a serpentine pattern. It’s not long before two of its siblings fall in behind it, including the goofy runt Dean might admit, at least to himself, that he’s a little fond of. Dean can’t help but be amused at the sight of three little balls of fluff swarming the feet of this gargantuan man, especially when Sam bends himself in half to pick up the littlest of the bunch.

They made a point not to name any of them; Bobby said that cats never really hang around once they discover there’s a shortage of rats in the junkyard. He also made a point that maybe Sam shouldn’t be getting attached to new things as confused as he was some days about the people who were already in his life. Dean agreed, vaguely, but Sam had this look on his face like he wasn’t going to let them stop him from taking care of something in need, and Dean wondered if giving Sam a task would help him, give him something to focus on.

So Dean sighed, scooped up a couple of kittens and placed them in Sam’s hands saying, “Don’t get too attached.” Six weeks later Dean named the little one ‘Bumpkin’ after the third time it knocked his tools all over the place.

Dean isn’t attached to Bumpkin by any means, and he’ll deny it to anyone who asks; it’s just that there’s still a ratchet missing somewhere and he’s pretty sure the little guy knows where it is. “They’re junkyard cats, Sam, I get that. Or, they’ll grow up to be, at least,” he says, watching as Bumpkin crawls his way out of Sam’s arms and clings to his shoulders. “But they’re supposed to be aloof and indifferent to humans, you know? Not…pawing all over me, and especially not over my car.”

Sam doesn’t speak much anymore, but Dean can tell by the amused look Sam gives him that his number is totally up. He wipes his hand off on the nearest rag he can find, an old Stanford shirt Sam had stuffed down deep in his duffel, and then tries snatch to Bumpkin off of Sam’s shoulders. “Besides, this furry guy’s more trouble than he’s worth,” Dean says, but there’s no heat to it.

Bumpkin hisses as Dean tugs at him, digs his claws into Sam’s shoulder. Sam winces a bit and Dean stops pulling. “Annoyingly stubborn little guy, isn’t he?” Sam smiles tightly and nods, and Dean steps away from him, hands up in the air. “Okay so I suppose you two belong together, then.”

Sam sticks his tongue out at Dean then easily scoops the kitten off his shoulders and carries him into the house. The other kittens follow at Sam’s heels. Both Bobby and Dean have tried to impress upon Sam the idea of outdoor-only pets, but well, Sam is stubborn. Dean supposes there are far worse ways this day could go than a little cat hair on Bobby’s aged furniture, so he lets Sam go and chooses to be grateful that there won’t be any other interruptions for at least a couple hours, when Bobby gets home and throws them all back outside.

Dean’s pretty okay with the good days.

~

II.

Some days are bad.

Routine is something Dean’s been used to all his life - the ups and downs of cheap hotel rooms, the hum of the engine, yes sir no sir, pushups and hunts and everything in between have been instilled in him since the age of four. Everyone always says routine is hard to change, and yet somehow, Dean has found himself changing fairly easily these last three months, holed up in Bobby’s house, sleeping in the same bedroom up the same creaky flight of stairs. Dean’s found it’s pretty easy to alter routine when his brother’s existence depends upon it.

Now, every morning Dean wakes before Sam, pulls what used to be his ‘just another minute Sam I’m still sleeping’ ass out of bed, bleary-eyed and body aching. Carefully, he repositions his brother’s limbs so that Sam won’t fall out of the pushed-together twin beds they now sleep in without Dean there to catch him. Then, Dean heads downstairs to make breakfast.

Dean doesn’t mind cooking for Sam, one simple task he can do to make Sam’s day a little bit better. Breakfast can be anything: peanut butter, toast, eggs, yesterday’s leftover chicken or the pizza Bobby brought home four days ago. But on the coldest days, it’s almost always a bowl of oatmeal because it’s warm and easy to make. Today, apple cinnamon is the only flavor left in the box, and Dean crinkles his nose and makes a mental note to remind Bobby to grab more when he gets a chance. Dean loves the crunch of a fresh apple, but he’s not so fond of the dried pieces in the instant oatmeal packaging, shriveled-up chunks that just create texture more than flavor.

Dean huddles in a rocking chair by the fireplace with his oatmeal, the chair protesting with every move he makes and three layers of scratchy blankets on top of him, some of them probably older than he is, like a majority of items found in Bobby’s house. Bumpkin purrs his way in and out between Dean’s legs before disappearing back into his hiding place; Dean figures it’s too cold even for a hairy furball like him.

They don’t light the fire anymore, no matter how cold it gets. Bobby started to once; the first time it dropped below 20 degrees, he threw a couple of fire logs in and lit it up like the fourth of July. Sam all but shrieked a repetitive litany of “no” as he dashed out of the room and up the stairs. It took Dean nearly a week to convince Sam it was safe to go back downstairs, promising him no more fires.

They haven’t lit a fire since that day, true to Dean’s word. Sometimes Dean still catches Sam glancing warily at the fireplace when he comes downstairs, but Dean never pushes the issue or tells Sam to get over it. Instead he wraps himself in more layers and does his best to help Bobby out with the heating bill with the little cash they have left. Sam never gets cold, walks around in t-shirts and bare feet like it’s closer to the fourth of July than the fourth of December.

Usually the oatmeal warms up Dean’s sleepy body as he eats it, but occasionally the rocking chair is counterproductive and the slow back and forth rocking lulls him back to sleep. He dozes as he waits for Sam to wake up, dreaming of the Impala - how she felt beneath him the first time he pressed the gas pedal, first time he pushed ninety, the first time he had a girl in the backseat, leather warm against his back as she rode him. He wishes he could somehow restore her to that car again: hundred thousand miles less, original frame, no busted tail lights or re-bent bumpers or gallons of blood spilled on less-faded upholstery. Dean dreams of things that can never be.

The sound of a door slamming followed by Sam screaming his name jerks Dean awake, empty oatmeal bowl falling to the floor with a loud clank. He tosses off the blankets and runs towards the noise, bounding up the steps two at a time, despite any protests his cold body might have. Dean always runs when Sam yells.

The door to their bedroom is never closed when Sam is alone in the room. Dean is careful to leave it open when he leaves in the morning, lets it catch on the swell of the floor in a natural door stop as he pulls it shut behind him. It’s yet another quirk of Sam’s Dean discovered when he tiptoed out to the bathroom in the middle of the night, sliding out of Sam’s vice grip once his bladder made clear it could not wait any longer. He heard Sam’s pitiful moans before he even managed to flush and took off running down the hall, fifteen long steps from one end to the other.

Sam curled up on the bed in his absence, staring at the door and trembling, but he’d relaxed the moment Dean crawled back into the bed and said, “I’m here, Sammy. It’s okay.” From then on Dean had made sure to leave the door open behind him when he left the room.

Today though, the door is closed when Dean makes it back up the stairs. He flings it open hard as he can, not thinking about anything but the noise that woke him. Sam huddles on the floor in the only free corner of the room, knees tucked to his chest and hands shielding his face from the unknown.

Dean steps cautiously as to not startle Sam any more, squats down beside him on the floor, squeezed between the bed frame and Sam’s trembling figure. He’s careful not to touch Sam. “What’s wrong, Sammy?”

Sam jumps a bit at the sound of Dean’s voice, his head jerking up and his eyes wide, like he didn’t realize Dean came in the room.

He swallows hard and glances to the door, eyes darting around the room. “Trapped.”

They’ve been here before, Sam in his protective ball and Dean on the outside looking in. Last time it happened when Bobby accidentally shattered an empty bottle of vodka, knocking it off of the table trying to reach for a pen. Usually Sam doesn’t even notice Dean, let alone speak to him, and for a moment Dean considers adding a mark in the ‘things are looking up’ column, but then Sam’s grasping at his wrist and pulling him in closer and every thought is lost to the warmth of his brother’s fingertips.

“How’d the door get closed?” Dean’s careful to speak quietly, hates that he has to treat his brother like a child or a mental patient off his meds but resigned to the fact that it’s the only method that works in certain situations.

“Accident. I stumbled. Clumsy. Too big.” Sam’s bottom lip trembles as he talks, and it reminds Dean of a time when Sam was two, still learning to talk and unsteady on his feet, a child with simple worries and fears staggering haphazardly about in the tiny apartment Dad settled them into for a few months while Dean started school.

“Look, the door’s open now. You’re okay.” Dean cups Sam’s head, pulls him closer. Sam relaxes a bit then curls into Dean’s side. Time passes as they sit together on the floor in silence, and Dean listens as Sam’s breathing evens out, as Sam’s grip loosens around his wrist.

“I don’t like it when it’s closed, Dean,” Sam says eventually, his voice muffled by Dean’s shoulder.

“I know you don’t, buddy. I know.”

~

Dean’s not so fond of the bad days.

III.

Some days are just plain strange.

Dean doesn’t know what to think of his life anymore, pretty content on just moving through it best he can, but he knows better than to look a gift horse in the mouth, especially when it comes in the form of a blinking neon sign.

“We’ll just stretch her legs,” he says to Bobby, creaking door of the only home he’s ever known calling to him, “See how she runs. It’ll be just like old times, only without the apocalypse and all that stuff.”

Bobby lets out an exasperated sigh, says, “So basically never,” then turns to Sam and cautions, “Don’t let your idiot brother do anything stupid.”

Sam ducks his head and tucks his cheek against his teeth, replies glibly, “Too late for that.” Dean still hasn’t gotten used to Sam speaking often, let alone Sam joking, so for a minute he stands between the two of them, looking back and forth like some parody of a cartoon character not in on the joke. Bobby also looks a little taken aback by Sam’s easy rapport but he recovers well enough, lets out a surprised laugh then claps Dean on the back.

“Just don’t forget about me,” he says, and Dean knows Bobby understands – the Impala is home and wherever she goes is good enough for the both of them. One glance at the excited glint in Sam’s eyes tells Dean all he needs to know, and he packs up their bags and has them pointed west before the sun hits the horizon.

 

Dean doesn’t know what state they’re in now, Iowa, Nebraska, doesn’t really care long as he’s got a full tank of gas and a delicious meal in front of him. Which he does. All he cares about right now is the burger dripping grease down to his elbows, the bubbles on the surface of his Coke glass, the feeling of Sam’s feet as they casually brush against his from across the table, and the look of contentment on Sam’s face as he takes his first bite into his equally large burger.

“This is good,” Sam mumbles around that bite, blob of ketchup at the corner of his mouth.

“I told you. When the word ‘DINER’ appears out of nowhere upon flashing neon signs, it’s the only sign from God I need to know where I’m going.” The whole sentence is garbled, Dean’s awful table manners in full display. He knows Sam doesn’t care; if Sam hasn’t gotten used to Dean’s inability to give a shit what people think about him by now he probably wouldn’t stick around.

Dean knows Sam’s the only one who could understand what he just said, and Sam just laughs in response.

“I’m somehow strangely amused that after everything, you still believe in ridiculous signs from God,” Sam says.

‘After everything’ is the closest Sam’s ever gotten to mentioning the last few years and Dean doesn’t want to push his luck, but sometimes he just can’t help it. Sam isn’t a talker about anything anymore and while Dean does enjoy the sound of his own voice, it’s nice to have someone else carry the conversation sometimes, too.

“Yeah, well. It’s an expression. Besides, I think after everything the least God can do is show me to a good meal, don’t you? Maybe next time he can even throw in a complimentary back massage.”

Sam laughs, open-mouthed and body shaking, and Dean’s taken aback because he can’t remember the last time he saw Sam so comfortable. It reminds him of a summer when he was seventeen, Dad always on Sam’s case and Sam always on his, every argument aggravated and amplified by the heat, hundred and ten in their black shiny car.

They pulled into a diner similar to this one, pink sign buzzing above their heads as the door dinged at their entrance, and Dad pointed them to a booth and took off for the bathroom. It was like a weight was lifted off of Sam’s shoulders the moment Dad left the frame - he sat up straighter, smiled at the waitress when she took drink orders, shoved at Dean’s feet playfully under the table.

Dad stayed in the bathroom a long time, long enough that Dean started to worry, but when it came time to order all his thoughts were erased when Sam said, “Hey what if we order Dad a plate full of livers and onions? I bet he’ll _love_ that.” And the mischievous look on Sam’s face was enough to make Dean chuckle, Sam’s cheesy grin and melodious laughter following right after.

Dean maybe fell a little in love with Sam’s stupid face that day.

Dean’s still back in his memories when Sam’s laughter stops abruptly, and he pales a bit as his eyes follow one of the waitresses heading out of the kitchen. Dean’s gotten used to Sam’s sudden mood changes over the past few months, but he never knows what’ll follow, whether it be laughter, tears, or on rare occasion, a desperate need to destroy everything in the vicinity.

“Sam?”

Sam snaps his gaze back toward Dean, refocuses. “I’ve been here before, Dean.”

Dean’s fairly certain he would remember these burgers. “I haven’t.” He’s also pretty sure he knows what that means.

Sam takes another bite of his burger, leaves Dean hanging in suspense as he chews for a minute, then says around the remnants, “I fucked that girl in the bathroom. She was really fond of having her ass slapped.” His voice is hushed, like he knows what he’s saying isn’t proper dinner conversation but he has to say it anyway, has to acknowledge the memory. Dean can understand that need but the statement still takes him by surprise and he drops his sandwich to the plate with a thud, grease flinging in every direction.

Dean really doesn’t like being reminded of the year and a half Sam spent without a soul, but he’s accepted it as a part of life, a part of Sam. Nevertheless, whenever that facet of Sam’s personality pops out, Dean’s whole body bristles and reacts. “Jesus. Sam, warn a guy.”

Sam ducks his head, suddenly embarrassed. “Sorry.”

Dean accepts the apology, mostly used to Sam’s weird ups and downs and everything-in-betweens and picks his sandwich back up. There really isn’t anything that’s going to stop him from finishing that baby, hell or high water, but he decides to push the matter, says, “So RoboSam liked getting his jollies off in diner bathrooms. That’s classy, man.”

Dean’s not really one to talk, considering his string of bathroom stall liaisons spread across forty-eight states, but he can’t help it, still overly interested at the idea of a Sam without Dean, without anything but the drive to go, to be, to do. Sometimes curiosity gets the best of him. He thinks maybe he shouldn’t have pushed the issue when Sam doesn’t answer.

Sam sits quietly across the table from Dean after his blunt confession, eyes still tracking the waitress, and Dean starts to worry.

“Sam? Wanna tell me what’s on your mind, dude? Because the look on your face right now is a little scary.”

“Just wondering how many other random waitresses, bartenders, and god knows what else he fucked. I fucked. I hope I was careful, can you imagine if there’s a bunch of pregnant women out there because of me?” He says the whole thing with a detached carefulness, but Dean can see when Sam realizes what he’s said by how wide his eyes get. “Oh god.”

Dean doesn’t want to think about Sam fucking anything right now, if he’s honest. He just wants to go back to enjoying his burger. “Relax, dude. He still had your brains even if he was boring as hell, so I’m sure he…you…used protection. Man, if we’re going to keep talking about him I vote we give him a different name, like Joe Blow or something. It’s just confusing and weird otherwise.”

“We don’t need to keep talking about him,” Sam hedges, but Dean knows a lie when he hears one.

“Uh, yeah, I think we do. I think _you_ do. Get him out of your system, so to speak.”

“He’s a part of me, Dean, there’s no getting him out!” Sam’s voice draws the attention of _that_ waitress, and he immediately lowers his head and slides down in the booth trying to hide is gigantic frame. He looks so ridiculous Dean has to work hard not to chuckle for fear of frustrating Sam even more.

“You know what I mean,” Dean says, his voice low. Right now the last thing they need is to draw attention to themselves, and he sees Sam make that realization as well, relaxing ever so slightly.

When Sam replies, his voice is equally as hushed but still just as tense. “No, Dean, I really don’t.”

“Sam, I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it a hundred times: you aren’t responsible for what your body did without you, as strange as that sounds. A man missing a moral compass can’t be expected to behave in a manner becoming a gentleman, you know?”

Sam cracks a small smile, and just like that his anger is gone. “File that under sentences I bet you never thought you’d say.”

“No, not really.”

~

Yeah, some days Dean doesn’t know quite what to think anymore.

IV.

Dean will never admit it out loud but most days he’s pretty okay with doing nothing but gazing at the stars with his little brother on the hood of the Impala, with the sky open above and maybe the slightest chill in the air.

They drive through Montana in the fall, on their way back to Bobby’s, after attending to an errand he sent them on, a case that turned out to be nothing supernatural, much to Dean’s relief. Dean bounces along to the music, foot on the pedal at a steady seventy-five, and he looks over at Sam and starts to make a joke about the length of Sam’s hair – long enough to curl against his collar now - but Sam has that look, like he’s getting too caught up in his own head, so instead Dean pulls the car to the side of the road.

Sam doesn’t say anything, even as Dean gets out the cooler and hops up onto the hood. Instead Sam just follows Dean’s lead, sliding his way up onto the Impala like he was born for it, no effort required, long legs out in front of him and the world at his back. Dean pops open a beer, hands it over, then pops one open for himself, the quiet snap-hiss of the cans the only communication needed between them. It’s breezy, and the low swoosh of the trees nearby drowns out the sound of their breathing, little puffs of steam forming with every breath out, and Dean wishes he’d grabbed his coat before hopping up onto the hood.

“You look like you got a lot on your mind,” Dean says after a bit, beer halfway gone and goosebumps on his arms.

“My mind’s always got a lot on it. A lot in it,” Sam replies. “Never shuts up,” he says, and laughs, low and tense, the tone of it unsettling, shaking something loose in Dean. He shivers, and not from the cold. Sam finishes off his beer in five big swigs, chucks the can off to the side in the bush. Dean hears the empty clink of it against some rocks, vaguely thinks that maybe they shouldn’t litter since cosmic forces seem to have it out for them. Then he figures it’s a little late to start living a clean life now.

“I want to hunt again, Dean,” Sam blurts. “Regularly. Not just bullshit errands like today. I can’t… I’m never gonna be right if we don’t just get back to normal.”

Dean’s pretty well accepted ‘normal’ isn’t a word that applies to them, thought Sam had too, somewhere back in between demon blood and angelic vessels, but he understands what Sam means nevertheless. “Okay. We’ll see what Bobby’s got when we get back to the house, maybe fish around in the papers and online and shit. We’ll start small, though, salt and burn or something.”

“Just something _real_ is all I need, Dean.” The desperation in Sam’s voice makes Dean’s heart ache. He’s tried his best to figure out what Sam needs to get back on all cylinders, without pushing too hard or asking too many questions, but sometimes that’s just not enough. Dean hates that he can’t just snap his fingers to fix his brother, but he’ll do whatever he can to try.

“Okay, Sammy. Something real.”

The sky is clear and dark, no clouds, no shooting stars or anything fancy, and barely a sliver of moon reflecting off the black metal of the Impala. Dean knows Sam can still name all the constellations if he thinks hard enough, though he’s never been sure if Sam learned them in school or if he knows them just because he’s a giant geek. Sometimes Sam even insists on trying to get Dean to learn them too, but Dean can only remember the important ones – the dippers, Orion the Hunter, the Gemini twins. Sometimes he can recognize Leo because it actually looks like a damn lion, but even then, usually only after Sam’s pointed it out.

Tonight he only sees stars, hundreds of thousands of tiny glowing dots on a giant blank canvas. It makes him feel small and inadequate and he suddenly wishes he’d kept on driving; that they were back in the safety of their bedroom at Bobby’s, warm in squeaky twin beds pushed together.

“The moon is a piece of me,” Sam says, startling Dean out of his melancholy and breaking the silence that’s wrapped itself around them like a cold bubble.

Dean snorts lightly and finishes off his beer, tossing it in the same general direction as Sam’s. "You say the craziest things sometimes, you know?"

"Well, if the shoe fits." The way Sam says it is self-deprecating, but the smile that follows is anything but, like it’s the funniest sentence anyone’s ever said, a joke that only the two of them are in on, and all of a sudden Dean’s caught up in the whirlwind that is his little brother.

He looks up at the sky, at the moon, at his brother, smiling lopsided at him. He laughs until he can’t breathe. "Am I a piece of you too, you goof?"

Sam doesn’t even hesitate when he says, "Of course," and the pure unfiltered honesty behind the immediate response catches Dean off guard. Sam’s still grinning, his hair hanging down in his eyes and his breath a light fog in front of his face, and Dean just gapes at him, watching how the strands move and his cheeks redden in the fall breeze. He couldn’t explain it if he tried, doesn’t really know what comes over him, but his Sam’s beaming at him with a smile he hasn’t seen in at least a year, he’s got a cooler of beer at his feet, an open sky above his head, and his baby at his back. So Dean kisses his brother.

Sam ‘oomphs,’ the little surprised sound escaping him when their lips first touch. Dean’s brain catches up with the rest of him pretty quickly at the noise, but he doesn’t jerk away and freak out, instead just slowly waits for Sam’s reaction, their lips hovering millimeters apart. Sam’s lips are cold and chapped from the wind and the way he always chews on them when he’s focusing too hard, and Dean tells himself not to freak out, not to move, not to breathe for fear of ruining the moment.

“What are we doing?” Sam finally asks into the empty space between them. Dean can feel Sam’s breath against his face, warm in the chilly night.

“Whatever you want to do. It’s your party.”

“Okay,” Sam says, then kisses his brother back, and Dean can’t think anymore, his lips warm and slippery under Sam’s, heat radiating off Sam’s body and soaking into every inch of Dean, every chill he had gone.

Vaguely Dean thinks that they’ve turned into a couple of teenage lovebirds, parking in the middle of nowhere and making oogly eyes under the stars, and he wants to comment, say something like ‘no chick flick moments’ to disperse the wave of emotion soaring up inside him. But Sam’s kissing him and his lips are soft and sweet and everything Dean forgot he loved out of life, so Dean just keeps his thoughts to himself and pulls his brother nearer to him.

Sam wraps a hand around Dean’s neck and pulls him even closer, legs twining together and hips bumping. The angle’s awkward and Dean’s elbows smack against the windshield and Sam’s ribs press against his uncomfortably, but he doesn’t care. Dean only cares about Sam, the way his face is flushed when he pulls back, how his breathing is heavy and there’s this twinkle in his eye that Dean’s never seen before. Sam just stares at Dean, and Dean waits for the awkwardness to hit, for them to both balk and jump apart and agree to never do this again, but it doesn’t happen.

Instead Sam folds himself into Dean’s body a little better, lining up their angles so nothing is poking or jabbing in painful ways, and _of course_ they fit together perfectly, Dean thinks, as Sam lays his head down under Dean’s chin and sighs contently.

“This is new,” Sam says.

Dean ‘mmhmms’ in response.

“I like it,” Sam says, and Dean can feel Sam’s smile against his throat.

“Well I guess it’s a good thing I like it too, otherwise this moment could get real awkward real quick, huh?”

Sam huffs. “I think we’re done with awkward, don’t you?”

Dean thinks back to a thousand longing stares in a hundred different hotel rooms, each of them pretending not to notice the other staring as they exited the shower, as they got dressed, as they stretched out on the bed. He thinks about watching Sam leave for Stanford, resigned in the fact that he missed his chance, and he thinks about that first moment he saw Sam upon returning from hell, how the world dropped away and the only thing left was the feeling of Sam’s arms around him. “Yeah, I think so,” he says. “So, tell me, geek boy, which stars are your favorites again?”

~

Yeah, some days are just a little left of center, as the expression goes.

V.

True to Dean’s word, they start small, going wherever the road and the case takes them. Most days they try not to stray too far from Bobby’s, two or three states at the most, short enough distance that Dean can make the drive back in a day if need be. Sam finally admits he feels safest in Bobby’s house -something Dean figured out six months ago - but they both agree they can’t stay there forever, underfoot like a couple of children. Well, mostly they agree.

"Stop treating me like a child," Sam says, knees hanging out the door of the Impala as Dean pumps seventy dollars worth of gas into her large tank. It’s cold, winter chasing them through state after state, and Dean shivers as he screws the gas cap back on. They’re only sixty or so miles from Bobby’s, but Dean’s tired of watching the price of gas rise and fall, playing the game to see where it’ll be cheapest, if he can just make it to the next station. He wants a full tank for whenever they choose to leave Bobby’s this time around, which, at the way his body’s still thrumming for more and the composed look Sam once again has in his eyes, will be sooner rather than later. But Dean doesn’t want to push it.

"Six months ago you weren't much better than a scared child, Sam, excuse me if I'm being a little cautious." It's an argument they have frequently, one that no one ever wins and solves nothing. Sam thinks he’s a-okay; Dean knows better.

They compromise by visiting Bobby, kicking back and having a beer by the fireplace, listening to Bobby talk about his latest haul of cars and helping him with the research of their next case, or maybe someone else’s. Bobby even mentions Castiel, but the news on their former angel friend is few and far between.

Sam can deal with the lit fireplace now, a prerequisite – according to Dean – for coming back on the job. “Half our job involves fire and death, Sam. If you’re not ready you’re not ready.”

“I’m ready,” Sam said, pulling the rocker up next to the fire and staring resolutely at Dean. Now he sits by it like everyone else, legs stretched out and warm beer in his hand, label half picked-off by hands desperate to keep moving, his body lazily drifting off as the night ambles on. Sometimes he still flinches when the flame gets too high or crackles too loud, a fact that Dean is wont to point out, but generally he holds his tongue, choosing instead to focus on the sound of Bobby’s voice as he describes whatever research he’s done for the case they may or may not take when they pull out of the drive the next morning.

“I’m sure even you two idjits can handle this one,” he says, handing Dean a tattered file folder of newspaper scraps and old photos. “Had it off to the side for a couple of months, didn’t really seem to take precedence over everything else. But honestly, there’s not much else on my radar right now. Things are quiet.”

“Because that’s not creepy at all,” Dean says.

“Yeah well, I’ve learned not to look a gift horse in the mouth, as the saying goes.”

Just as Bobby finishes speaking, there’s a loud boom against the door that startles Sam into dropping his beer, foamy liquid curling under the rocker’s legs and against his feet. Dean jumps up and grabs for the nearest shotgun, propped up in the next room against the poor excuse of a kitchen table Bobby keeps, rickety wooden thing about to fall down with too much weight on top of it. No one ever comes knocking on Bobby Singer’s door, and generally those that do bring with them trouble or pain or both.

“Shouldn’t have said nothing,” he whispers to Sam and Dean. Bobby’s still six feet away from the door, gun in his hand and Dean ready to back him up if need be. Sam just huddles by the fireplace. “Who’s there?”

“Open the door,” says the voice on the other side.

Bobby looks back and forth between Sam and Dean and Dean wonders if his face in anyway mirrors the shock on Bobby’s as he says, “Castiel?”

They knew they weren’t going to be able to avoid him forever, still half confused why he let them go in the first place, but they never expected him to just show up on the doorstep.

Bobby opens the door, despite all of Dean’s protests otherwise. “Well if I don’t he’ll probably just Apparate in here. Or worse, destroy my front door. I just fixed that door last week after the last time you two fools destroyed it. Besides, if he wanted to kill us he’d probably have already done it a thousand times over.” Dean has to admit Bobby has a point, but he still doesn’t like the idea.

Castiel is a ragged, bloody mess when Bobby swings the door open, looking far more like a man having a shitty time of it than the ‘new God’ he claims to be. He’s barely upright, his whole weight resting against the door frame, and he stumbles into Dean’s arms the moment he steps through the threshold.

For a moment Dean is reminded of another time, one not better but simply different. But only for a moment.

“Whoa there, Cas,” he says, “Not exactly looking the part of an all-powerful being here.”

“Uh, Dean? I think it might be best not to taunt the celestial being that could kill us with a snap of his fingers,” Bobby says quietly, pulling the nearest chair underneath Castiel, into which Dean drops him with a heavy thunk.

“Point taken.” Dean likes to think he’s gotten over being terrified in the face of Castiel, just another one of those shitty things that happens in a long line of shitty things, but humor and sarcasm are his only defense, at this point. “So what happened? Purgatory-power not enough for you? Find someone who didn’t want to be your sheep?”

“I found a large pocket of resistance that overwhelmed me temporarily, yes. I just need a moment to rest and I’ll be on my way.” Bumpkin peeks his little head out from the basket he generally hides in, makes a confused ‘meow’ when he notices Castiel, then hisses when Castiel turns to look at him. “A cat, Bobby? I never pictured you the type.”

“Leave the cat alone,” Sam practically growls from the corner of the room.

Dean mostly ignores the exchange, though the anger in Sam’s voice doesn’t go unnoticed. “Every port in a storm, huh. Well that’s just… peachy. Remind me again why we should help you? Last time we saw each other you told me to bow at your feet. I think you know how I feel about that,” Dean snaps.

“What do you want me to say? ‘If you don’t let me rest for a moment I’ll kill you?’ I don’t want to kill you, Dean.” Castiel tilts his head to the left, in that awkward way Dean used to find amusing. Now he only finds it frustrating, a reminder of how things have changed and how he can’t change them back.

“Well I suppose that’s good to know.” The wounds on Castiel’s chest and face heal even as he speaks, claw marks and puncture wounds fading into nothingness. Dean watches the pieces of skin stitch themselves back together, smooth over, until the only sign that remains of Castiel’s injuries is the dried blood and ripped trench coat. Dean figures eventually those will disappear with a thought too. “Get healed and then get out. We’re not your friends anymore.”

Castiel departs not five minutes later, not another word spoken between the four of them, just Dean pacing a hole in the floor, Bobby with his gun trained on Castiel - for all the good it would do - and Sam silent in the corner.

“I can’t believe him. I can’t,” Dean says once the fluttering of angel wings passes, leaving nothing but an empty chair and a few drops of blood beneath it. “I mean, coming here, what did he expect, a red carpet welcome?”

“Dean, just… let it go,” Sam says quietly. “We’ll figure out Castiel later. Hey look, we’re still alive and I’m not a gibbering mess on the floor. Can we start there?”

“I notice you didn’t say much while he was here.” Dean says it harsher and more accusingly than he means to, especially considering the way Sam bristles in response. Dean doesn’t want to argue, sees the way Sam’s hands are balled up and how white his knuckles are, but sometimes he can’t help it, long-ago learned defense mechanism for any situation in which he feels helpless.

Sam scoffs. “What do you want me to say? ‘Hey thanks for the trip through mental hell – oh wait.’ It was pretty much all I could do to not lose my shit right there on the spot, especially after the way he looked at the damn cat that you wanted to keep as much as I did and don’t you try to convince me otherwise.”

“I –,”

Bobby, who’s been practically staring at the door with his mouth agape since the moment Castiel came in, finally smacks his hand on the desk and says, “I’m the only one who didn’t want the damn cat, and it’s my house. And yet somehow I’m stuck with it when you idjits aren’t here. All your strays end up here, and that still seems to include Castiel, for whatever reason. I say we just be grateful he still considers us friend and not foe, considering. ”

~

It’s not enough. But it’ll do. For now.

 

VI.

Some days are just different.

Over the years, Dean’s gotten used to stumbling into hideous motel rooms with all sorts of whacky designs – disco balls, westerns, seventeenth century gothic, the list goes on and on.

The room they’re checked into for tonight is none of those things. In fact, Dean thinks it’s the simplest room he’s ever been in – no ugly bedspreads, no tacky seventies wallpaper, no bizarre abstract paintings hanging on the wall above the bed. There’s not even a worn or stained spot on the carpet, just a simple blue and silver color scheme and polished wooden furniture. Dean will happily admit that Sam’s suggestion they pull over for the night here was a good one.

Dean’s admiring the cable selection of their awesome motel room when Sam comes out of the bathroom, freshly showered and not covered in dust and bugs after being chased through a corn field by an angry farmer whose land did not, in fact, hold the body they were looking for. Dean can see the little cuts up and down Sam’s arms left by the sharp edges of the stalks, and there’s still a gash above his eye from one particularly sharp run-in. There are also matching fingerprint-shaped bruises along each hipbone and Dean feels himself flush slightly with the knowledge that he put them there.

Sam, meanwhile, is completely oblivious to the way Dean’s tracking his naked body, frowning deeper and deeper as he rummages through his duffel for a clean-ish pair of boxers to sleep in. “I don’t think I want to hunt anymore,” he says.  
“What? Sam, the reason we’re hunting at all is because you said you wanted to!” Dean explodes, all notions of Sam’s skin left in the dust, anger rising like a tidal wave in his chest.

In response Sam just grins at Dean’s apparent overreaction, sticking his tongue between his teeth and tossing a stray sock in Dean’s direction. “I was just trying it on, listening to how it sounds.”

Dean should’ve known Sam was pulling his leg. “Yeah, how’d that feel?” He tosses the sock back in retaliation, but the loose threads catch around his fingers, making it land several inches short of his intended goal of Sam’s chest.

“Awful. Foreign.” Dean watches as Sam pulls on the last clean shirt from his bag, far too thin and old to wear out in public. It’s stretched out and there’s a faded pattern on the front that Dean vaguely thinks he recognizes as something he used to own, and it’s too big on Sam’s huge frame, a feat in and of itself -though staring at his brother, Dean notices the places where he’s not quite as filled out as he was when they first reunited last year, leaner in the hips and arms.

Dean snaps his attention back up to Sam’s face the moment Sam starts talking again. “Hunting is what we do, Dean. I feel wrong doing anything else, now, after everything. And we’ll do it until we die. And then probably do it some more, way things seem to go.”

Sam on a muddy old path falling to his knees, Sam jumping in a pit to save the world, Sam an automaton who doesn’t sleep – these are the things that flash through Dean’s head. “No,” he says, a little more heated than intended judging by the look on Sam’s face, but he pushes on. “No more deals, Sam. No more cheating death, not as far as I’m concerned. Don’t get me wrong, you die, I’m gonna try and follow as soon as possible. This world is shit without you in it. But we’ve spent too much of our lives with the consequences of dying hanging over our heads and I’m done.”

Dean hadn’t intended to make a big speech and bring the euphoric tone of the evening to a screeching halt, but he succeeded nevertheless. As he speaks, he watches as Sam’s expression, at first stubborn as usual, turns thoughtful and intense, then far away when he mentions he wouldn’t be long in a world without Sam in it. It’s as close to saying ‘I love you’ as he’ll probably ever get.

He waits for the tired and lame ‘you have to go on without me’ speech they’ve both given each other one too many times in their lives, but eventually Sam just shrugs, flips the covers back on their bed and says, “Okay.”

Dean likes every night that ends with them agreeing on something, considering how much things have changed as Sam’s mind heals - things like how well they work as a team again, how close they are, like sometimes Dean knows what Sam is thinking before he thinks it and vice versa, despite everything that happened between them the last few years. Dean often finds himself wondering if he’s locked up in a tiny white room somewhere, drugged all to hell and dreaming of a life only as perfect as his warped head could come up with.

The bed must be comfortable, if Sam’s quiet snoring is anything to go by. Dean will never understand how Sam somehow magically falls asleep in five minutes after dozing in the car for hours. Dean’s heart still thrums from the hunt, adrenaline still pumping and his mind still coming up with ‘what if’ scenarios, like ‘what if Sam hadn’t seen the flash of the farmer’s gun’ or ‘what if you’d zigged left when Sam had zagged right and you lost each other in the maze of corn?’ They’re the same fears about Sam Dean has dealt with his entire life, fears he thought he’d gotten used to, accepted as part of the job.

Except lately, Dean can’t shake them, like he’s twenty-two again and Sam’s stepping into the unknown without Dean there to protect him, like he’s watching Sam jump into a giant hole in the ground knowing he’ll never see him again. Dean _knows_ it’s irrational, but that doesn’t stop his brain from running through every scenario it can come up with. Most nights, the only way Dean gets to sleep is by watching the rise and fall of Sam’s chest in the bed next to him, hands tucked under the pillow and his feet hanging off the edges.

Dean won’t admit it, but the suggestion Bobby of all people made for them to start sleeping in the same bed as a form of comfort for Sam has also been calming to Dean. He likes to keep Sam close, likes to keep him safe by keeping him close; likes to keep himself sane by keeping Sam close and safe. Sometimes he thinks that even with all the excuses he could make, he watches Sam sleep simply to remind himself that Sam is real and alive and whole.

Despite what a bed hog Sam has turned into, a far cry from the small curled ball he’d try to make himself become months ago, Dean doesn’t mind sharing, doesn’t mind feeling the bed move when Sam moves, hearing Sam’s calm breathing next to him, feeling the heat of Sam’s body radiating off of him in the dark. He especially doesn’t mind when Sam wraps an arm around him and pulls him in close, kisses the back of his neck; Dean never thought he’d enjoy being the little spoon.

Sam snuffles in his sleep, his face tensing up and his eyebrows bunching together. Dean knows the signs of Sam’s bad dreams like the back of his hand now, knows that next Sam will start whimpering quietly, his mouth forming the word ‘no,’ but no sounds will come out. If he’s fortunate, the dream will pass quickly and Sam’s breathing will even out as he drifts back to a peaceful sleep.  
Dean’s tried to sleep through enough nights next to Sam to know that most evenings the nightmare grows until Sam twists himself up into a defensive position, shoving his knees into Dean’s sides or back or whatever part Dean’s decided is the least vulnerable as he drifted off to bed that night.

Tonight, Dean says, “Sammy?” before Sam’s barely started to move. “Hey. Wake up, kiddo.”

Sam’s eyes open slowly, bleary and still a hint of terror flashing. “Dean?” His voice is hoarse.

“Nightmare. Figured you’d want me to wake you before you, uh, hurt yourself again.” Once Dean slept through Sam’s thrashing, far too exhausted for his body to handle anymore, and woke up to red on the sheets and Sam in the bathroom patching up his arms where he’d scratched them bloody in his sleep. Never again, Dean promised himself as he wrapped up Sam’s arms and told him to stop apologizing for things he couldn’t control.

“Mother hen,” Sam says, a thank-you in his own sleepy way.

“You’re welcome.” Sam curls in closer to Dean on the bed, and Dean stretches his arm around to accommodate Sam’s broad shoulders. It’s not cuddling; it’s just getting comfortable. “How’s that head of yours doing anyway?”

“Mmmmm,” Sam responds , already halfway back to sleep before Dean asks the question. “Some days are fine. Some days are kinda confusing.”

“Like today?”

“Today was fine until you ran off without me.”

“You said run so I ran, Sam.”

“Oh.” Moonlight shines through the slim crack in the curtain, just light enough for Dean to watch Sam’s face. “I don’t remember saying anything,” he says, and the lines appear on his forehead as he frowns, thinks too hard about the past like he always does, as if he could go back and fix something, even after all this time. It’s a part of Sam Dean loves and hates all at the same time.

“Well there’s the answer to my question.”

Sam sighs. “I’m fine, Dean, really. Just…sometimes things remind me of…things and I freak out a bit. I’m pretty sure you can understand what that feels like.”

“My hell experience and yours were two different things,” Dean hedges. He’s tried to breech this conversation before, grasp some idea of the nightmares bouncing around inside Sam’s head to compare with his own, curiosity grabbing a hold of him, but Sam never opens up. The cage was a horrible place for Sam, Dean won’t argue with that, Lucifer and Michael trapped in there with nothing to do but play around with his mind. Even so, Dean’s grateful for one thing: at least Alastair wasn’t in Sam’s hell, too.

“Yeah, they were. Which is why even if I did tell you what was going through my head, you wouldn’t understand. Now can I go back to sleep?”

Dean rolls his eyes, thinks about pushing the subject. Used to be Sam wanted to talk everything out, and Dean never thought he’d miss those days. “And here everyone says I’m the one with avoidance issues. Fine. Goodnight, princess.”

~

Some days, Dean possibly wishes they could talk about their feelings like two emotionally stable men instead of dancing around the issues like a couple of injured ballerinas.

 

VII.

It doesn’t happen often, but some days actually go according to plan. Those are the days Dean considers himself lucky.

“Lucky?” Sam scoffs when Dean brings it up. “Honestly Dean, of all the words you can use to describe us, ‘lucky’ doesn’t even register. Unless it’s opposite day and no one told me.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” The rain’s hitting the window faster than the wipers can clear it off and Dean’s eyes are starting to blur, but he doesn’t yet want to pull over. He doesn’t want the good day to end, doesn’t want his stupid cheeky brother to stop mocking him, to fall asleep and wake up with nightmares in his eyes the next morning.

Sam’s sprawled out in the passenger seat, legs pressing up against the glove box, same position he’s been in since they left the last motel. He’s clean and showered, something they don’t usually have time for after a hunt, usually too busy getting the hell out of dodge before the cops show up.

Dean looks at his brother and decides to push his luck. “Hey, you want to drive?”

“What? You haven’t let me drive since –.” There’s a million ways that sentence could end, Dean thinks. _Since Castiel became another something against us, Since you went a little cuckoo, since you said yes to Lucifer, since Ruby._ Since a sea of other bad days piled one on top of the other, all of them ending in ‘since Dean trusted his brother.’

It’s not even a question he need ask himself now.

“Well, you haven’t been exactly a hundred percent lucid lately, you know?” He has been better, much better than nearly a year ago, but sometimes Dean still catches him looking at his hands like they belong to someone else or staring off into space like he’s in another place and time.

Sam sticks his tongue out, then smiles. “Who’s to say I am now?” Dean thinks maybe the trick to all ‘lucky’ days is to get Sam smiling as much as possible.

“Well, you’re doing a good job of faking it then.” A semi flies by them in the other lane and drenches the windshield in muddy, road-logged water and Dean flips the switch for the wiper fluid. It doesn’t really make a difference. Dean pulls the car to a stop on the shoulder and holds up the keys. The rain pounds down around them and the next car that drives by coats the windshield with more muddy slop but inside it’s just the two of them and a simple question, undemanding yet weighted all at the same time. “You wanna drive or not?”

“Of course I do.” Sam snatches the keys out of Dean’s hand and gives him a light peck on the lips, and Dean rolls his eyes. He hasn’t really gotten used to this new way Sam shows affection, touching him as much as possible and kissing him every quiet moment they have. It’s still new and he still has trouble accepting that his _brother_ loves him like he does. One time he even tried to hold hands and Dean quickly rebuffed him, his hand still tingling from the warmth of Sam’s grip. Dean’s never been the public affection type but sometimes he wants to cling to Sam and never let go.

“You’re such a girl, Sammy.”

“Shut up, you love me.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say.” The rain lets up the moment Sam starts the car, like nature’s acceptance that the Winchesters will continue on no matter what happens, and Dean gets comfortable, perfectly content to let Sam take the wheel and drive for awhile, not afraid anything bad will happen. It’s a rare feeling and he wants to savor it as much as possible, so he spreads himself out in his own passenger seat, feeling the way the leather is shaped to Sam’s ass, how it’s warm from Sam’s body, how comfortably he fits in the space Sam just vacated. He wonders if Sam’s having an equal experience in the driver’s seat. “Maybe I’ll show you how much if you think you’re up to it.”

“I’m up to it.” Sam’s always ‘up to it’ where Dean is concerned. Dean secretly loves it. At least, he hopes it’s a secret but judging by the lecherous look on Sam’s face, he’s not so sure anymore.

“Yeah well, keep the car on the road for a few hours then we’ll see about a blowjob.” Maybe he’s teasing, he doesn’t know and neither does Sam. But Dean’s never given road head, there’s definitely a first time for everything, and there’s no one he likes sharing first times with more than Sam.

Despite making several jabs about how he’ll be watching Sam’s driving like a hawk ‘just in case,’ Dean nods off after only a couple hours of sitting shotgun, the steady hum of the engine and rainfall too much for his forever weary body. He dreams of Sam, eighteen and going off to college on his own for the first time, and Dean feels a little lost, losing a piece of himself as well when Sam walks out the door for the last time. Then the dream changes, and Sam’s twenty-six, sitting in the Impala next to him like it’s just another day, endless road in front of them and the music blaring so loud Dean can’t actually hear what Sam is saying but it doesn’t matter, because Sam is there and Sam is smiling.

Dean doesn’t wake up until the car rolls to a stop in front of Bobby’s front porch.

~

In the end, every day is a good day, as long as they have each other.


End file.
